Omniculpability = Omniscience + Omnipotence

Ethics, Morality, and Sin

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Compassionist
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Omniculpability = Omniscience + Omnipotence

Post #1

Post by Compassionist »

Omniculpability = Omniscience + Omnipotence. If God exists and if God is omniscient and omnipotent, then, God must be held accountable for failing to prevent all suffering, unfairness and deaths. God is not exempt from ethical conduct. Culpability is directly proportional to power. The greater the power, the greater the culpability. Since living and non-living things are neither omniscient nor omnipotent, we are not omniculpable.

“Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent.
Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent.
Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil?
Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?”
― Epicurus

“Ethics, too, are nothing but reverence for life. This is what gives me the fundamental principle of morality, namely, that good consists in maintaining, promoting, and enhancing life, and that destroying, injuring, and limiting life are evil.” – Albert Schweitzer, “Civilization and Ethics”, 1949. Doing good is always good. Doing evil is always evil.

nobspeople
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Re: Omniculpability = Omniscience + Omnipotence

Post #2

Post by nobspeople »

Compassionist wrote: Sat Dec 26, 2020 6:54 pm Omniculpability = Omniscience + Omnipotence. If God exists and if God is omniscient and omnipotent, then, God must be held accountable for failing to prevent all suffering, unfairness and deaths. God is not exempt from ethical conduct. Culpability is directly proportional to power. The greater the power, the greater the culpability. Since living and non-living things are neither omniscient nor omnipotent, we are not omniculpable.

“Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent.
Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent.
Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil?
Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?”
― Epicurus

“Ethics, too, are nothing but reverence for life. This is what gives me the fundamental principle of morality, namely, that good consists in maintaining, promoting, and enhancing life, and that destroying, injuring, and limiting life are evil.” – Albert Schweitzer, “Civilization and Ethics”, 1949. Doing good is always good. Doing evil is always evil.
Good and evil is relative so many times.
That said, there's a train of thought that those that believe God is good/Satan is evil are wrong.
So is there universal good and evil, or does it change over time?
Have a great, potentially godless, day!

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Purple Knight
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Re: Omniculpability = Omniscience + Omnipotence

Post #3

Post by Purple Knight »

The usual objection is free will.

He is able, and unwilling, because he is unwilling to stifle free will.

If he really did give people immortal souls, then he's found a sort of a workaround to even really allowing evil, because this reality is basically just a horrible, horrible dream. We wake up and put it all behind us.

So he's essentially culpable for nothing because it's all just a simulation. We think it's real, so we're actually culpable for what we do.

I've often thought about this scenario and I can't really come to a conclusion about how I see it morally. Is it okay to put people through horrible torture just because it's not real? One thing I ponder is that when we wake from a nightmare, we're perhaps so ready to forget it and move on only because the events that transpired within had no consequences. But the paradox is that over enough time, having enough horrible nightmares with enough regularity will have consequences for the psyche.

So let's say that when feels like a lot of suffering here, is actually over in a blink and it only happens once and it has no real consequences except those we brought on ourselves.

I'm not sure how I feel about that, because I am in the dream now and it's horrid. I want out. I want that this should never have been done to me... but who the heck knows; I might have even asked for it. So the me that's me now hates it, but the other me maybe doesn't and I have to answer as if I'm him: The dreamer who just woke up from a bad nightmare and probably asked to go in deep into the horror and prove himself. My life is a console game to him, and that sucks, and we're not really the same person, and I think I ought to say that I object to this treatment.

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Miles
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Re: Omniculpability = Omniscience + Omnipotence

Post #4

Post by Miles »

nobspeople wrote: Fri Feb 19, 2021 12:20 pm
Compassionist wrote: Sat Dec 26, 2020 6:54 pm Omniculpability = Omniscience + Omnipotence. If God exists and if God is omniscient and omnipotent, then, God must be held accountable for failing to prevent all suffering, unfairness and deaths. God is not exempt from ethical conduct. Culpability is directly proportional to power. The greater the power, the greater the culpability. Since living and non-living things are neither omniscient nor omnipotent, we are not omniculpable.

“Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent.
Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent.
Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil?
Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?”
― Epicurus

“Ethics, too, are nothing but reverence for life. This is what gives me the fundamental principle of morality, namely, that good consists in maintaining, promoting, and enhancing life, and that destroying, injuring, and limiting life are evil.” – Albert Schweitzer, “Civilization and Ethics”, 1949. Doing good is always good. Doing evil is always evil.
Good and evil is relative so many times.
That said, there's a train of thought that those that believe God is good/Satan is evil are wrong.
So is there universal good and evil, or does it change over time?
Depends on who's telling the story.


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